austin cubed: the misadventures of building a modern/contemporary/green home in austin, tejas
Just got a tree and topo survey done on our lot. In a tree and topo survey, professional surveyors survey lot limits, location of important trees (generally larger than 8 inches in diameter, although we asked to have a few smaller ones located), and slope (topography) of the land surface. This is all important stuff because you don’t want the house built on top of nice trees (most architects won’t want to do this, appropriately so) and knowing the topography is important for designing the foundation and considering drainage. If you have existing structures, you’ll need to know where those are as well.
We solicited three bids and went with the low bid in small part because it was the low bid and in large part because they were the only ones that included a detailed list of deliverables. Our tree survey quote included a dozen trees (although the surveyors went ahead and did some more, including one just off the property line [per city code nearby trees have to be considered when designing a house]). If your lot is bigger and/or more topographic and/or has more trees, survey costs are probably higher. If you get a survey done when buying the property, be sure to also get the tree and topo done. Probably saves money in the long run.
We provided each surveyor we invited to bid a copy of the pre-existing survey (no tree, no topo) we got when we bought the property. We figured the company that made that survey would get the topo-tree work since they didn’t have to completely reinvent the wheel, but they didn’t seem to take that into consideration in their bidding (something to consider if you go with the original surveyor thinking you’ll get a built-in deal). A word of advice when getting a survey: ask whether or not you get the AutoCAD file (the digital version of the survey in vector format [with all of the lines]) and then ask to get the file after the survey is done. This is something your architect is going to want and will save you a little time and money during the design phase.
Some of you may be saying to yourself “Yo! Bubba! Shouldn’t you have already had a survey done with all that previous designing you did with Architect 1.0?” Excellent question. Methinks yes. However, in reality, this didn’t happen. In fact, the survey (or lack thereof) was the first hint that Architect 1.0 was going to be a potential pain to work with. For some reason (it was never explained), Architect 1.0 chose to do the tree survey himself. At the time, I wondered about this, since he had previously mentioned that we would need to get a tree and topo survey at some point and stressed the importance of getting three bids. However, he was the expert, so I didn’t make an issue of it, although it was a minor irritant because he charged us for measuring the location of the trees. That seemed odd since we were eventually (?) going to get them professionally surveyed.
After Architect 1.0 developed the initial design, I trekked to the site to stake out the floorplan. It was then I realized that he didn’t have the trees properly located. Most were off a relatively minor amount and one, one he designed the house around, was off some 20 feet, it’s actual location in the middle of the kitchen island (which could have been a nice design feature, I reckon!). The diagram above shows the result of the recent survey in black and where Architect 1.0 had the trees by his survey. At our next design meeting, I politely noted that the trees did not appear to be in the correct locations. Good Gawd, was that the wrong thing to say. He seemed surprised and asked how I measured them. I started my answer with “from the curb…” to which he immediately responded “That’s wrong. We don’t know where the curb is.” I noted that his survey showed the location of the curb (presumably this came from the professional survey we got when we bought the lot). Nevertheless, my measurement from the back of the lot confirmed the mislocation of said tree. “You can’t measure that way,” was his reply. I then asked where he measured from (because where else could he have?) to which he quickly pivot-pouted to “The location of the trees is not important.” I noted that he had designed the house around one of the trees (#58 on the survey above; see the red dot “to the south” of #58 to see where he placed the tree) not to mention that the house was pushed back on the lot more than it had to be due to the trees in the front and that one tree was much closer to the garage than he showed.
As a manager of some 60 to 80 people, I do not expect perfection. Perfection simply does not exist. And good, competent people make mistakes from time to time. One thing I do expect is an appropriate response to a mistake. Do you acknowledge that you made a mistake? Do you work to fix the mistake? Do you work to ensure it doesn’t happen again? It’s employees that refuse to admit they’ve done something wrong, even when faced with unimpeachable evidence to the contrary, that are trouble. I learned the hard way early in my career that it’s important to own my mistakes. In fact, so few people own their mistakes that when you do so, it pleasantly catches folks off guard. Yes, you’ve admitted you’re not perfect, but you’ve also shown that you can be trusted to ensure something is ultimately done right, even if mistakes are made, as they inevitably are, along the way.
You may also be asking “Bubba! Why didn’t y’all fire that dude when this happened?” In retrospect, I wish we had fully explored the tree issue when it happened. Perhaps we would have fired him at that time if he had remained recalcitrant and defensive, and perhaps it would have prevented later issues that ultimately became fatal to the relationship. (This was the first time Architect 1.0 demonstrated his penchant for (1) denying a mistake had been made [the trees remained misplaced through the design process] and (2), when faced with evidence to the contrary, blaming the client for the mistake.) At the time it seemed like a relatively minor issue (“Save the Hackberries!!!” is not one of our rallying cries; if the tree had been an ancient oak or pecan, perhaps it would have been different...). The booboos would eventually be resolved with a real survey (something I would have eventually insisted on) and the house shifted appropriately. And working with big egos is something I do at my day job. With that, rightly or wrongly, I’ve learned to work around egos and keep my eye on the prize. At this point, we had worked with Architect 1.0 for at least a year while lot-searching with no problems and were developing a healthy friendship, so we cut him some slack. Everyone has their quirks. On the other hand, this was the first time we had (politely) confronted him with something we thought he had done wrong, and his response was a little disturbing.
So to all you budding (and budded) architects out there (probably not) reading this blog: Turn down the ego and own your mistakes! Not doing so is disrespectful to your clients (my bride and I have five technical degrees between the two of us: we know how to use a tape measure) and bad for business. I also highly recommend letting the surveyors do the surveying.
